Punk, Politics & Shady Landlords with Jason Buckley

Jason Buckley drops into the pond for a conversation about punk rock, rent control, women-led music festivals, labor activism, and the weird ways community forms when life gets hard.

Siobhan first met Jason at the She Shreds Music Fest, where he was running stage sound while helping his band Star Strut pull off an ambitious women-in-music festival that almost unraveled from pure chaos and exhaustion… but somehow came together beautifully anyway.

From there, the conversation bounces through Hudson Valley nostalgia, brutal East Coast winters, DC’s legendary punk scene, underground radio stations, and Jason’s early days working with the AFL-CIO during Union Summer. They dig into how music, politics, labor organizing, and community activism all overlap more than people realize.

The episode eventually lands in Alameda, where skyrocketing rents and a nightmare landlord pushed Jason into the fight for tenant protections through the Alameda Renters Coalition. What started as personal frustration turned into years of grassroots organizing, political battles, and helping shape local rent control efforts.

Along the way, Siobhan and Jason also talk punk culture, weird music rabbit holes, growing up musical, and why kids would probably enjoy music education a whole lot more if somebody handed them a Charlie Parker album instead of another boring recital piece.

It’s funny, thoughtful, political, nostalgic, and very Ducking Realitea: casual conversations about serious sh*t.